Day to Day

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas!

Last year around this time, I was waiting for my son to be born. I had all of these grand ideas of sending out Christmas cards and birth announcements. I really felt like it was the perfect time to start sending out family Christmas cards. However, I underestimated how much work a newborn would be! I never got those Christmas cards sent out last year but this year, I will be sending out Christmas cards if it’s the last thing that I do!

I love Shutterfly. I have used them time and time again for the events in my life! The latest example being the invitations that I made for my son’s first birthday. The thing that I love most about this company is how easy they make it for you to add your own personal pictures to their cards. The card that I picked for Evan’s invitations is this one. I was very impressed with their selection of boy 1st birthday invitations! The quality of the cards was more than I could’ve asked for. I know where I’ll be getting my Thank You cards from! 

Thanks to the Clever Girls Collective, I’m being given this huge blessing to receive my Christmas cards from Shutterfly! As I have gone through the Christmas cards, there have been many that have caught my eye. In the past, when I look for a card, I have a difficult time deciding from all the choices Shutterfly has given me. This time, I thought that I would put Shutterfly to the test! If you know me, it is a well known fact that I absolutely love glitter. If I give you a birthday card (or any kind of card) it will most likely have glitter on it. When I am given cards, there is about a 95% chance that those cards will have glitter on them too! So, when I saw that Shutterfly had a Christmas Card with glitter on it, I knew I found my perfect match. 

                         Glitter Glamour Joy Christmas Card

Oh, how happy this card makes me. It has everything that I could want in a card and more! Glitter, family, and holiday spirit! I cannot wait to share this card with my family and friends! 

How about you? Would you like 50 free holiday cards from Shutterfly? Click here to go to Shutterfly for information on how you can get 50 free cards this holiday season, and make sure to select Clever 1000 as the referral source.

This post is part of a series sponsored by Shutterfly. I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective.

8 days late

Every night, I lay in bed replaying Evan’s birth in my head. And every night I think to myself that I need to take the time and actually write it out. It’s 5 weeks since his birth and I am now able to find time to do things around the house (i.e. clean, cook, check things online, etc).

Evan was 8 days late. I knew going into the month of November that a due date is just a date. I completely understood that just because his due date was November 19th that it didn’t mean that I would meet him on that date. HOWEVER, I did not think that I would be over a week late. Mentally, I was starting to use it. All I could think about during those 8 days was the fact that I wasn’t in labor yet. I was done being pregnant.

I had an amazing pregnancy. It was textbook. I never had morning sickness, I didn’t gain too much weight, I didn’t have heartburn, I was able to sleep at night, I was able to walk fast, being pregnant never slowed me down. I can’t express enough how much I loved being pregnant and feeling him kick. It was the most amazing feeling ever. But, by the time November rolled around, I was done. I no longer wanted to be pregnant. (side note, I miss being pregnant now)

Since he was “overdue” I had to go in for non-stress tests twice a week. These got old fast. He was a very active baby and always passed the tests with flying colors. It almost felt like the nurses were laughing at how active he was.

On the night of my due date, I went and saw New Moon with my friends Adam, Rachel, B, and Anamarie. I bought the ticket in advance with the idea that I was either going to be in labor that night or enjoying New Moon. Since I wasn’t in labor, going to see New Moon made everything better.

At my last midwife appointment, she told me that if I didn’t have him in a week, that she would induce me on the night of November 30th and the baby would be born on December 1st. It was nice to finally have a date. If anything, the baby would be born on December 1st. The thing was, I didn’t want him to be on December 1st. For 9 months, I thought that I was going to be having a baby in November. It sounds stupid, but I had a difficult time accepting a December birthday. The other thing was, I wanted him to have a golden birthday he was going to be able to remember. My golden birthday was on the 21st and it was one of the greatest birthdays ever. All petty things, I know.

On Thanksgiving, I woke up and decided that I was going to pretend that I wasn’t pregnant. I wasn’t suppose to be pregnant on Thanksgiving, so I wasn’t even going to think about it. I even put boots while heels on (I quickly took them off and put flats on after we got to my in-laws). My pretending to not be pregnant didn’t go well. Me still being pregnant was a hot topic during Thanksgiving.

Once we got home, Dan and I stayed up late talking. I ended up trying to go to bed around 2am. As I was getting ready to go to bed, I noticed that I was leaking a little fluid. I told Dan about it because I wasn’t sure it was my water breaking or just my bladder not working. I didn’t really think it was my water breaking because there wasn’t much fluid at all. I started feeling mild contractions, which was about the time that I started getting excited!

I told Dan about everything I was feeling, and he ended up staying up all night reading about labor online. I ended up going to bed for an hour or two. When I woke up the contractions were gone. Words cannot begin to express how disappointed I was. I was beginning to get frustrated with my body. My body enjoyed being pregnant way too much for my liking at this point.

I had a non-stress test scheduled for that morning which I, for some reason, took my labor bags with me. When I got to the hospital for the test, my midwife was there. I ended up telling her about the fluid so she checked me to make sure everything was fine. When she checked me, she saw no signs of labor and told me that she would see me on Monday, which was the day that she was planning on inducing me.

I was sent downstairs for an ultrasound to check to make sure the baby was okay. Sidenote - I had a male ultrasound tech for the first time. He must’ve been a body builder because I have never seen a person so buff in my life. I called him beefcakes for the rest of the day (and everytime I told the birth story). For this test they had to make sure that he passed 8 check points. I’ll never forget how nerve wrecking I found ultrasounds to be. Especially since there’s not much talking done during an ultrasound. This one wasn’t any different. Still nerve wrecking.

After the ultrasound, I went upstairs while they processed Evan’s score. While they did that, the nurse put me back on a stress test. About 20 minutes later the nurse came back and told us “Good news! He got a 6/8 points!” So Dan and I started to get up to leave. That’s when the nurse said “Okay, we are going to move you down the hall and get you ready.” I remember being so confused. I thought she said good new. Turns out, my water had broken in the middle of the night and Evan had no amniotic fluid and needed to be delivered as soon as possible. This came as a shock!

I couldn’t that today was going to be the day. From there on, my life has been a whirlwind. It hasn’t slowed down since. Since there was no amniotic fluid and I wasn’t experiencing any contractions they had to put me on a steady flow of pitocin around noon. Seeing that pitocin was the drug that I was trying to stay away from, I found it ironic that it was the drug that was needed to deliver this baby.

Both my mom and Rachel came to the hospital to hang out for the first three hours. We walked around the floor the whole time. Having them there really helped pass the first few hours. I was feeling slight contractions but nothing major. Around 3, I felt something change in the contractions and I knew that I wanted to be alone. The contractions started getting worse right after they left. It was like a light switch had been flipped on.

The birthing ball and the birthing pool were my best friends during the whole labor. I can’t imagine trying to have a birth without pain meds without those two things. Around 4, they checked me and I was at 4cm. I got permission to go into the birthing pool. I can’t even express the relief that the pool provided me. After an hour, I got out and they called my midwife. When my midwife got there, she checked me and I was at 8cm. I couldn’t believe I went from 4cm to 8cm in an hour!

At this point, the contractions were unbearable. I started to tell Dan that I didn’t want to do this anymore. I couldn’t understand how I was suppose to actually push this kid out. The idea just seemed outrageous (it still is). My midwife, who stayed with us, could tell by this point how far along I was just by my breathing and by what I was saying. During this time, I asked her if contractions caused my pitocin were actually worse than natural contractions. She said no. But I asked around and found out that she was probably lying to me to make it easier. She reassured me that it was going to be over sooner than I thought.

Around 8pm, I felt the need to push. It’s such an overwhelming desire and at this point I had relief that I felt it. I was so afraid that that feeling would never happen. Dan was so amazing the whole time but his shining moment was during this time. He said all the right things and did all the right things. After an hour and some odd minutes of pushing, Evan Caleb was born at 9:39pm. He was 8lbs 7oz and perfect.

The rest of the night was a blur. I lost a good amount of blood and my placenta wouldn’t detatch so my midwife had to manually pull it out (they don’t tell you that can happen in birthing classes. I think that hurt more than actual labor. No joke). But I did it. It’s probably the proudest moment of my life. It’s a high that can’t be expressed.

I just wanted to thank everybody to came to visit. Dan and I were so blessed with all the love and joy that you gave us. :)

Not the greatest picture but at this point I didn’t care anymore. 41 weeks 1 day